With new feature Situation Critical, we present artists with various life situations-- some joyous, some terrible, some bizarre-- to find out which songs, albums, or bands they would turn to under those specific circumstances. This time, we spoke with bassist extraordinare Thundercat, aka Stephen Bruner, whose new albumApocalypseis out now.

You're riding in the car with your parents...

Driving around with my dad growing up, he would play everything: Philip Bailey, Manhattan Transfer, Frank Zappa, Cream. I'd be like, “Dad, cut this stuff off!” And he’d say, “No, you’re gonna listen to it.” I didn't understand why he liked it so much. In my mind, I would be thinking about the theme song to "Sonic the Hedgehog". But that's how he introduced me to Jaco Pastorius. The day I finally was like, “I love this song!” he just started laughing and said, “I got you!” He put on "Portrait of Tracy" and I put the video game down.

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You're hosting a dinner party...

When I invite people over to my apartment, they usually don’t like it because the music I play confuses the crap out of them-- I’m making people listen to the "Final Fantasy" soundtrack and they’re like, “Why is this happening? Let’s just leave and find somebody who wants us to have fun and not teach us about something.” Sometimes I try to do what my dad did to me in the car-- but in a very twisted way. It usually doesn’t work out.

But listening to a song you heard as a kid later on as an adult can put it in a different light. People will be like, “Is that 'Sonic the Hedgehog?' I used to love that game!” They’ll be listening to the song without the game and be like, “Dang, this is some serious, well-put-together music." Then they'll ask for the album, and I’m like, “No, you go get it yourself.” I spent 20 years looking for the "Sonic the Hedgehog" album.

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You're running on a treadmill at the gym...

I would listen to something really, really stupid, like "Living Inside Myself" by Gino Vannelli, because I think running is stupid. [laughs] Reading and exercising are two things in life that are not necessary. They're kind of like telephone poles at this point-- they're just there to scare the shit out of us. We should just start hanging really cool lanterns from telephone poles.

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You're playing along to something while practicing bass...

Sometimes I practice to Allan Holdsworth or John McLaughlin, but I don’t just practice to jazz and jazz-fusion albums. I’ll practice to TV theme music-- one of my favorites is "MAS*H". I'll just play along with anything on the TV. It's like multi-tasking, but nothing's actually getting accomplished: I’m staring at the TV, so I’m not paying attention to the instrument. But then I’ll be playing what’s on TV, so I’m not paying attention to the show.

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It's four in the morning and you can't fall asleep...

I'm a heavy sleeper, and every once in awhile, I have that fear of waking up to someone in my house staring at me, masturbating, with a bag over their head. [laughs] But then I remember that will probably not happen. But if I was awake in the middle of the night, I'd probably listen to Mahavishnu Orchestra. Growing up, that was something that would make me think-- I would always try to understand different parts of what was going on in the music. I still do that. Hearing those cats playing, you don’t know where it’s coming from.

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You're rocking a boombox at the beach...

Maybe the soundtrack to "Street Fighter", so people would be really confused as they're trying to enjoy some time with their family-- just to cause a little bit of dissention.

I just discovered that a really good combination is "Call of Duty" and Sade. During our last tour, we were playing that game relentlessly, and everybody’s partying and drinking, and doing their thing, and then Sade came on. I’m literally shooting an M16 with a pistol grip, and I felt like I could die in peace. It was insanity. Very juxtaposed.

Oh, I’m messing my daughter up. We mostly listen to instrumental music in the car. I like to play her things to see how her brain works. She won’t tell me what she likes-- the relationship between a guy and his daughter is different than a father and son-- but I'll be playing stuff and looking at her reactions in the rearview mirror. I’ll put on George Duke, Herbie Hancock, or J Dilla, and she just sits there and doesn’t say anything. I’ll cut it off and she’s like, “Can you put on Beyoncé?” But then she’ll surprise me and make a reference to something-- she could tell when George Duke was playing, she recognized his chops. It blew my mind.